


Windblown

by AnonymousOtter



Series: Heavy Storm [2]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: During Timeskip (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Other, POV Hilda Valentine Goneril
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-17 11:14:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29591961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonymousOtter/pseuds/AnonymousOtter
Summary: Hilda imagined war would be a lot of things."Boring" wasn't on her list.
Relationships: Hilda Valentine Goneril & Claude von Riegan
Series: Heavy Storm [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2175168
Kudos: 9





	Windblown

**Author's Note:**

> Based on Hilda's "Goes back home to a wealth of free time" profile line.

Hilda hated the cold. 

When the Gonerils decided to move to the Locket after the fall of Garreg Mach, the servants made sure she would be installed in the warmest room of the fortress, just above the kitchens.

They coated the walls with tapestries and covered the floor with heavy furs, but no amount of burning wood nor the thick curtains could stop the bone-chilling wind blowing against the windows and infiltrating the cracks in the stones.

It had been almost half a year since Edelgard’s declaration of war and despite what her father’s precautions could suggest, the Alliance never entered the conflict officially. Surely, it wouldn’t be long before they’d return to their mansion in the valley down below. And it was cold as well, there, but it was nothing compared to the snow-capped peaks of the Throat and their restless winds.

However, the first morning Hilda woke up to her sheets covered by frost, she took a pen and wrote the most exquisite letter to Marianne, whom she knew was in Edmund Territory, where the weather was notably mild during winter—if not a bit humid. She implored her friend and the margrave Edmund to accommodate her in what she considered proudly the most beautiful prose she had ever put in writing.

But much to her dismay, when came the time to entrust her precious request to the messengers posted on the Locket—her father’s approval could come second—they politely refused her.

They had received strict orders from above: in times of war, they couldn’t afford to monopolise the staff and resources for trivial matters.

Hilda thought that maybe, she had misread badly this whole situation. Perhaps this war wasn’t as distant as she had believed, and her family had preserved her too much.

She retreated to her rooms and pouted for a while, realising she had to accept her fate made of cold, windy days and infinite boredom.

There were only so many books and so much handwork to keep her occupied, these days. When the first snows fell on the fortress on the second week of Wyvern Moon, she decided to brave the cold and to go outside.

Covered by a thick layer of snow, the Throat was unnaturally quiet. The sky was so blue it almost hurt the eye. But it was a pretty view; she could admit as much. Too bad the idea of taking off her gloves to draw it sounded like a punishment.

She leaned on the parapet of the rampart and she remembered the last winter spent in Garreg Mach, when they all went outside to play in the snow. It was so fun then; she came to forget about the cold.

She sighed. Those days were long gone. All there was left was boredom and a terrible lack of friends. At this time of the year, even Almyra wouldn’t risk attacking the Throat. The Locket was effectively cut off from the rest of the world. It was a lonely, quiet refuge. _A prison_ , she thought dramatically.

On this particular night, as Hilda prepared for bed, she winced looking at her face in the mirror. Getting herself exposed to the cold wind was doing her no favour, and her usually perfect skin was all red and irritated. She reached for a small box inside her console. It contained a lotion: shea butter with almond and honey. It was a gift from Claude. Turned out, his knowledge in chemistry had some practical applications. As of why he knew so much about cosmetics in the first place, well, that was a secret she had yet to uncover.

Hilda spread the lotion all over her face, and it was a bit hard to the touch at first, but it quickly softened and melted in contact with her warm skin. She massaged her cheeks and her forehead where the skin had suffered the most, and when she was satisfied, she blew off the candles sited on the console and made her way to her bed.

As she opened her sheets, she heard a knock on her window, followed quickly by two others. Hilda winced, eyes fixated on the closed curtains, then looked at the clock on the wall. It was so very late for these sorts of games.

But if she was a master when it came to delay tasks or even just disobey in general, the man she knew was outside her window was one she couldn’t refuse anything to. She sighed, and she opened the curtains in a dramatic motion.

Claude stood there, taping his feet against the marble of the terrasse. Hilda didn’t flinch. It wasn’t the first time indeed he’d play this trick on her.

The truth was, she had never been truly alone in the Locket.

Oh, sure, she had little distractions during the day, her family too busy talking politics and war to entertain her, but once or twice a week, Claude would fly all the way down from Derdriu on his wyvern to pay her a visit at night. It was a two-hour fly at best, but he was stubborn. And, in this instant, visibly frozen.

He gesticulated something to her attention, and she could hear him just fine despite the glass standing between them, but it was enough of a hindrance she easily pretended otherwise. When she turned her back to him, she heard his protests and she smiled to herself.

Oh, he was such a nuisance.

She put a heavy blanket around her shoulders for she was wearing nothing more than her nightclothes, and Claude was visibly relieved as she moved to the windows to finally open them. In contact with the lotion still on her face, the cold wind froze her to the bone.

The things she’d do for him.

“One day, my brother will find you there, and he’ll kill you,” she simply said.

Claude laughed awkwardly, the tip of his nose red from the cold as he passed her to make his way inside. He looked disproportionally big, enveloped in his coat and in multiple layers of scarves. With every step, he left a trail of water on the carpets. “Surely Holst wouldn’t lay a finger on the heir of the Alliance,” he said, rubbing his arms energetically.

Hilda closed the doors and shivered. “But he wouldn’t think twice about shooting down an Almyran,” she said.

Something changed on Claude’s face for a split second before he put on his usual mask again. Hilda had enough time to notice. She always noticed everything about him.

“It’s because of the wyvern, isn’t it?” Claude said, scratching the back of his head sheepishly.

Hilda crooked a brow.

“Well, I’m on the right side of the border, aren’t I…?” he added, and he urged his wyvern to take off with a move of the hand before Hilda closed the curtains once again.

Claude was the only former student Hilda was seeing consistently since the beginning of the war. While his excursions to the Locket completely ruined her sleep schedule, Hilda was amused by it at first. They were friends and had been ever since they integrated the Academy together. She never saw the harm in welcoming him into this impregnable fortress, late at night, in her own bedroom. Claude seemed immune or simply blind to her charms, and she had come to accept this truth, no matter how her gaze was irresistibly drawn to him.

After all, she could still value his friendship and, in these trying times, his company. Her family could stop her letters and the snow could stop her travels, but nothing and especially no one could stand between Claude and whatever he had set his mind to.

Hilda observed him as he took off his gloves and kneeled beside the hearth to heat his hands near the dying fire.

“Gloucester is seriously testing my patience,” he said without even turning around to face her.

Sitting on her bed, Hilda frowned.

Alas, these days, Claude wasn’t the fun, charming kid he used to be if only half a year ago. His talks were always as cold as the wind blasting outside.

He looked sweet, still, the tips of his ears still red and his locks more rebellious than ever because of the snow. He sneezed and she threw a cloth at him without saying a word. “He’s trying to play it cool, but he’s still trading with the Empire…” Claude’s voice was muffled by his movements as he was drying his hair as well as he could. “Am I to believe he doesn’t know the risks of emptying our stocks when the Empire might as well decide to give us the cold shoulder tomorrow? Does he think I am _that_ stupid and I’m not seeing right through his little game?”

Claude finally took off his thick coat and he put it on a chair near the fire to dry. He added a log in the hearth for good measure.

War had changed him. When Hilda recounted him her days in the Locket and the last trivia of the noblemen living there, he barely listened to her. He was visiting for what felt more like self-centred purposes. To speak about the war, about politics, about the Church. None of this interested her. None of this was the sort of topics they used to talk about together.

Hilda’s eyes went to his face, and he looked tired and determined. They were close in age, but it was clear enough that if she remained a child, Claude was the sort of teenager who was forced to grow too soon. And the more he was speaking about import quotas and politics, the more Hilda came to understand that he had always been like that. He simply used to have someone else to share these serious matters with, someone else who was privileged enough to see this intimate, deep side of him.

That person wasn’t there anymore.

“Any news about Almyra?” Claude asked, pulling her away from her thoughts.

“I already told you, I’m not seeing my brother much…” Hilda murmured.

“And yet you live under the same roof.”

She sighed. “He barely leaves the garrison, and this place is way too cold for me to walk around. Or for anyone with half a brain, anyway.”

“My sweet Hilda,” Claude said, and he smirked, “maybe one day I should take you on my wyvern so you can get accustomed to the cold once and for all.”

“Well, no, thank you.” She grimaced. She loved to fly well enough, but certainly not when it was freezing.

“Hey now, it’s not that bad,” Claude continued, grinning. “Actually, it is cold, I’ll give you that, but when you are up there, you simply stop feeling your skin at all after a while and—”

“No thank you,” she repeated, accentuating each word. He laughed and it was so contagious it was impossible to be mad at him. “Take me to Derdriu instead, Claude,” she murmured. “Or to your mysterious homeland. Isn’t it hot there?”

His gaze became unfocused again. When he answered, his smile didn’t seem all that genuine anymore. “I can’t do that right now,” he said.

“Then what do you want, Claude?” She had not meant to sound so exasperated, but she did regardless. “I can’t listen to your ramblings every other night, you know,” she said. “I need my beauty sleep, and I don’t understand much of the stuff you are talking about.”

Claude gulped. “Well, I thought it might interest you, since—”

“Obviously, it doesn’t!” she cut him.

Claude wasn’t smiling anymore, now. He looked at her, almost surprised, and he kneeled in front of her.

“Sorry, Hilda,” he said. “I need to let out some steam and I know you can keep my secrets, that’s all. Are you mad at me?”

“You know it’s impossible to be mad at you,” she said with a small smile, lost in his big, doe eyes. “Tell me to swing an axe, and I will. To fight for you, to protect you, I will. But politics…” She shrugged.

Claude tapped on her knee softly and straightened. “Good! Because I actually need your expertise!”

“My expertise?”

Claude seemed strangely on the edge suddenly, shifting from one foot to another, as if he was struggling to find his words. “See, I…” He rattled his throat. “The Roundtable isn’t taking me seriously at all. You could say that’s a problem.”

“I just told you I don’t—”

“Shush, let me finish. This is precisely why I need you, Hilda.” Claude started to walk in circles in the middle of the room. “Imagine if tomorrow, you had to convince…” He paused. “Say, Seteth. You have to convince Seteth that you are hard-working and trustable. That would be hard, right?”

“You are rude. I can be both.”

“Sure, but Seteth doesn’t know that. For him you are forever lazy Hilda.” She grimaced. “Well, it’s the same with me and the Roundtable,” Claude continued. “To put it bluntly, all they see in me is the kid I was two years ago. You know I can be serious, but I need your help to fix the rest, because I know next to nothing when it comes to impress old Alliance nobles.”

Hilda blinked. “You came here to get a makeover!?”

She’d laugh at the idea, but this sounded surreal coming from Claude of all people, who was so careful with his image.

But now that she was thinking about it, she could see where he was coming from. Claude was good when he wanted to get into the good graces of young, gullible people. But as far as adults were involved … not so much. The Alliance elders were used to people sneakier than him; Margrave Edmund the last shining example of a truly pernicious parvenu who had managed to progress all the way to the top.

Hilda knew next to nothing about politics, but she was more than knowledgeable when it came to seduction—and she now realised why Claude was relying on her, of all people, to guide him.

She felt strangely proud. She couldn’t fill the hole the Professor had left behind, but she could still bring him _something_.

She stood up and approached him as he stepped back. Without wearing heels, she felt so very small next to him.

“First,” she started, a finger on her plump lips, “you need to check your posture. Standing with your hip, like this…” She imitated him and he chuckled. “It’s not very noble-like, you know.”

“Wow, calm down, Lorenz,” Claude teased, but he adjusted his stance immediately. His back straight and his chest puffed, he looked more like the part.

She walked around him; eyes curious. “Your style isn’t all that common,” she commented, “but it suits you well. Let’s be honest, you’d look ridiculous in regular noble garb.” This made him laugh again. Hilda smiled to herself. She loved having that sort of power over him.

“Same for this,” she said, pinching his earring. “You really wouldn’t be yourself without it.”

“So, I’m already perfect, then?” Claude said, a cocky tone in his voice.

“Shush, I never said that. Actually, there’s one fatal flaw to your looks.”

“Oh, really?”

“Your hair,” Hilda stated, pointing at him. Claude touched his head almost out of reflex. “Your braid is cute, but it’s definitely … childish.”

“Childish!?” Claude almost screamed.

“You should cut it,” Hilda said.

Claude pouted as the mention and she wondered if she had hit a nerve. “Not only that,” she continued, “the whole cut gives you an irredeemable babyface. If I were Gloucester, I wouldn’t take you seriously either.”

“Now, that’s a low blow,” Claude murmured.

“You asked for my opinion! I won’t coddle you!”

“Fine, fine… I’ll let you do as you wish…

“To be perfectly honest… You are the only person I’d trust with my looks,” he said, slightly embarrassed.

So, Hilda installed Claude in front of the mirror and she lit her candles again. Claude eyed at her in the reflection as she took out her scissors. His gaze was different from usual, reflected in that mirror. Clearer. Truer.

In one quick move and without warning, Hilda cut off his braid and Claude seemed to wince and grind his teeth, as if she had sectioned a finger instead. She put the strand of black hair aside on the console and looked for a product in the drawer.

Claude’s reflection observed her in silence as she spread out lotion on her hands. She planted her fingers at the roots of his hair, on his forehead, and slowly moved them backwards. She combed his wild locks one by one with expertise and watched Claude’s face in the mirror. His eyes closed, a small smile on his lips, he looked calm and satisfied.

“All done,” she said after a minute or so, adjusting one last strand at the top of his head which just wouldn’t obey her.

She loved the result. His hair combed back and plastered elegantly to his head, he looked much more serious than usual. The changes were minor, but the new look highlighted his green eyes and his sharp cheeks. His best features, Hilda would say.

Claude seemed mostly unnerved; his eyebrows crooked awkwardly. “I look so…”

“ … noble.” Hilda grinned, tapping on his shoulders.

“Yeah…” Claude tilted his head, a vague pout on his lips and a hand tracing the side of his jaw where his braid used to be.

“Isn’t it _exactly_ what you asked for? Show some enthusiasm!” Hilda said.

Claude touched the top of his head, as if he couldn’t believe it was possible to flatten his hair like that.

“It is…” He gulped. “I need to get used to it,” he mused.

Hilda stayed in silence, observing him as he familiarised himself with his new looks.

“Good. It’s good,” Claude murmured after a while, nodding slowly.

“For the authentic Alliance look, you would need to grow the hair more. And a beard,” Hilda added half-amused. “But I’m not sure even you would pull it off.” She grinned and Claude failed to look offended.

He stayed around a few hours more, enough for Hilda to explain to him in detail some other tricks she knew. Those weren’t the type of information a qualified butler could have taught him, nor things someone estranged from the Alliance’s inner circles for so long would know. It was the result of years spent making her way through upper society, feigning embarrassment all while rejecting suitors and bending people to her will while pretending otherwise. Hilda knew Claude was a good manipulator, but in this particular context, he had met his master.

Claude called his wyvern back when the first lights of day appeared on the horizon. The sky was still dark, but perfectly clear. It would be yet another beautiful, freezing day. He got on his mount and adjusted the gloves on his hands all while exchanging banalities with her.

“Oh, and Hilda,” he added. “You can return to your beauty sleeps. I won’t be bothering you again.”

“Uh? Are you giving up on me?” she whined. “Please, no! The war won’t get me, but I can guarantee you that boredom will!”

Claude scratched the back of his head. Yet another reflex she should have told him to drop. It made him look too insecure. “I’m just going to be very busy,” he said. “But don’t worry, I won’t let you miss me. I’ll write to you!”

“Mail isn’t going through,” Hilda mused, watching him adjust his reins.

“But _my_ letters will!” Claude winked at her, and he took off.

Hilda went back to bed, nestled under her covers with a hottie close to her cold feet. She thought about Claude on his wyvern, his new hairstyle already completely windblown. She hoped this would be enough to motivate him to come back sometimes. She fell asleep, the smell of lotion still strong on her hands.

She woke up a few hours later to a cold room. When she opened the door, she almost bumped right into her brother standing there.

“Ah, Hilda! I was about to wake you up!”

Holst was all geared up, towering her. “Father, mother and I need to fly to Derdriu,” he said.

Hilda yawned. This was already way too much information for someone who’d just wake up. “Did something happen?” she asked.

“The old duke died,” Holst said.

Hilda caught her breath. “Riegan…?”

Holst nodded and he attached his helmet. “Two days ago, apparently. But with this weather, the news only reached us this morning.” He checked the sword secured on his waist.

“Your friend… Claude von Riegan. He’s summoning us to a roundtable.” He laughed. “He’s been nothing more than his grand-father’s puppy, staying silent and only doing whatever the duke wanted. But I guess he’s in charge now. I wonder how he’ll fare.” He displayed the most carnivorous smile. “We’re probably going to eat him alive.”

“Gosh, Holst,” Hilda said, “please don’t tell you are planning to—”

“—push him?” Holst leaned over her. “I’m afraid we won’t have much choice if he doesn’t adopt a strong stance. He cannot play dead like the late duke. He’ll have to pick a side, or the Alliance will implode. Get prepared for war, sister. There’s no way we won’t be involved now.”

A shiver ran down her spine, and Hilda knew the cold wasn’t to blame this time around. “Isn’t there another way…?” she murmured, thinking about the battlefield in Garreg Mach.

Holst laughed. “If there was a way, then surely we would have found it!” He grinned and, oblivious to Hilda’s protests, he rustled her hair. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, be a good girl, and watch over the Locket while we are away, will you?”

Hilda closed the door and stayed there, her back pressed against it as she processed the information.

“He died two days ago…” she murmured. Her eyes wandered across the room until they found Claude’s braid that she had left on the console.

Would there ever come a time when Claude would be entirely transparent with her? Probably not. He still held many secrets close to his chest. But if there was a way to spare the Alliance in this war, Claude would be the one to find it.

 _Oh, you silly brother, you have no idea,_ she thought. _You are the ones about to be eaten._


End file.
